Hidden in the Leaves
by DAzebras
Summary: [KakaIru, rating may 1up later] I'm not sure where this is goingI'm trying the whole plot thing.  The 1st chapter is a scene from Iruka's class, with Naruto skipping training and Kakashi barging in to look for him, of course.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: Obviously I don't own _Naruto. _Kakashi wears a mask, doesn't he? Oh, yes. Shini is the creation of **Momosportif.** Thank you, dearie.

This will _eventually_ be KakaIru. Next chapter starts the hints, maybe?

* * *

Umino Iruka sighed as he unlocked the classroom door, juggling his satchel, stack of papers, and a cup of coffee as he searched for the correct key. He swung open the door and froze.

"Naruto, what are you doing up there?" he asked the young blond boy hanging upside-down the classroom window.

The blue-eyed teen's lips curled into his trademark pointy-toothed grin as he answered his former teacher, "Ebisu-san said he'd treat me to ramen if I can keep Konohamaru-kun from sneaking out of class today. Is it okay if I just hang out here today, Iruka-sensei?"

"Won't all the blood have rushed to your head by the time class is over?" Iruka joked as he set his belongings on the wooden desk at the front of the room and made his way to the window where Naruto was hanging. After opening the glass, he replied, "sure you can stay here and keep an eye on Konohamaru-kun. It'd probably be a good idea to listen in on the lesson too. We're doing transformation jutsu today."

Naruto wrinkled his nose and stuck out his tongue. Transformations had been his second worst subject in school, which was a feat of its own. He grimaced as he remembered his repeatedly failed attempts at a Third Hokage look-a-like. "Is the kid any good at them?"

Iruka smiled. "He _is_ the Third's grandson. He had no problem with that transformation. He hasn't quite mastered the other ones yet. How is your training going?"

He crossed to the front of the class room and began arranging the contents of his forest green bag on his desk while he waited for Naruto to climb through the open window. He looked up when he heard the look click as Naruto closed the glass.

Naruto glanced up at Iruka and then down at his toes, avoiding the older man's brown eyes. "Training's fine," he answered vaguely.

The Academy teacher raised a quizzical eyebrow. "What do you mean by 'fine'?"

Naruto's head jerked up at the unexpected question. "Huh? Oh, just the usual: Sasuke being a jerk, Sakura-chan hanging all over him, Kakashi-sensei being late for training."

Iruka looked at him kindly. "Would you help me take those chairs down, Naruto-kun?" he asked, moving away from his desk to remove a chair from a desk in the front row.

The two soon had all the desks prepared for the young class that would soon arrive -- Iruka's rows far neater than those on the opposite side of the room. Naruto staked out his post next to the window in the back of the room. With Naruto settled, Iruka returned to his own desk and began to order the stacks of paper from his satchel. After taking a swig of his now lukewarm coffee, he started to grade the papers left over from the night before.

"Iruka-sensei," the boy whined after a few minutes, "I'm bored."

The young teacher looked up from the slowly thinning pile of quizzes. "Wait just a while longer. Maya-chan usually comes in about fifteen minutes from now."

"But I'm bored _now_."

"Then find some way to entertain yourself. I need to finish grading these before class starts."

Naruto sighed dejectedly and resigned himself to staring out the window at a small brown bird in a nearby tree. When it flew out of sight, he rested his forehead on the desk in front of him in hopes of a short catnap before class started.

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"Hey! Naruto-nii! What are you doing here?"

The fox-whiskered teen awoke to a rough nudging of his arm. He lifted his head to stare blearily at the short brunette boy standing beside him. "Hey there, Konohamaru-kun."

"Boss, why are you in Iruka-sensei's class?"

"Don't you have training to do?" asked a wide-eyed, pigtailed girl named Moegi.

"Don't ask him stupid questions like that," the Third Hokage's grandson chided. "So. Why _are_ you here?"

"Because your crazy, closet pervert sensei asked me to keep an eye on you," Naruto answered, stretching his arms above his head. "He said he'd treat me to ramen if I kept you from sneaking out of class today."

"So, are you going to do it?"

Naruto snorted at the younger girl's question. "Of course. This is free ramen we're talking about! Besides, think of who it is that' paying for it."

That comment earned a snicker from Konohamaru. "Ebisu-sensei is in for the meal of his life!"

"Naruto! Konohamaru! Be quiet back there, you two!" scolded the brown-haired Chunin, hands on his hips in no-nonsense teacher mode. "And Shini! How many times do I have to tell you not to put bugs in Takashi-kun's hair?!"

Iruka turned and retrieved a small stack of worksheets from his desk. After handing the correct number of papers to the head of each row, he began to explain the activity's instructions. "First, identify the true statements. Then --"

"Iruka-sensei," Konohamaru interrupted, "I think we all know how to read."

He narrowed his eyes and turned to glare at the young boy. "Well, if that's so, you can all read the directions to yourselves and predict the changes I've made to them."

This class wide punishment evoked a chorus of groans and whined complaints at the unfairness from the pre-Genins.

'Oh crap!' thought Naruto. Out loud he added, "See you later Konohamaru-kun!"

With that, he hurriedly opened the window and leapt out. After landing on his feet, he broke into a run which carried him out of site among the streets leading towards the center of town.

"What was that all about?" Iruka asked aloud, receiving only a nonchalant shrug from Konohamaru in response.

A moment later, he nearly jumped out of his skin as the door to his left creaked open. A lithe man in standard issue garb slouched through the door to Iruka's desk. His face was covered by a cloth mask across the lower half and forehead protector tilted over his left eye.

"Ka- Kakashi-sensei!" Iruka stuttered in surprise at the Jonin teacher who had just walked through the door. "What can I do for you?"

"Hmm…" His visible slate gray eye scanned the class with a seemingly bored expression. After taking in the open window, Hatake Kakashi turned back to the Chunin teacher beside him. "Have you by any chance seen Naruto-kun this morning?"

"Naruto kun? He just left a few minutes ago. Why?"

"Ah. Well," Kakashi drawled, "he never showed up for training this morning. I already checked his house and the ramen bar, and he wasn't there. Sakura-chan thought you might know where he's run off to."

"He was here until just a while ago. He told me that Ebisu-sensei said he would treat him to ramen if Naruto could keep Konohamaru-kun from skipping class today."

"While skipping out of training without my permission in the process. If you'll excuse me, Iruka-sensei," Kakashi said, walking quickly to the window and perching himself of the sill, "I must be going."

With that, he leapt from the window and continued in the vague direction Naruto had a mere five minutes earlier. Iruka strode to the window and peered out.

"An odd pair, aren't they?" commented the girl named Maya.

"That they are," Iruka agreed, turning to face her.

"You know, I think I should go help Kakashi-sensei catch him," reasoned Konohamaru as he climbed onto the sill and prepared to follow after the Jonin and his Genin pupil.

Iruka swiftly turned around in time to catch hold of the back of the boy's yellow shirt and hauled him back inside, shutting and locking the window behind him. "I don't think so, Konohamaru-kun."

-End Chapter 1-

* * *

I was told that I should add extra story here in the first chapter. What do you, the reader, think?

Thanks to **Momosportif** [as always, Fishy [my human-Beta, and Briggs.

Let's play a game: There's a prize for anyone who can guess who Shini is. [You don't count, schizo, though I'll give you something anyway if you guess.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Wow. Sorry it's been forever. My well of Naruto inspiration has just about dried up, but I'd written this a long while ago and finally got around to typing it.

Many thanks to those who faved/alerted/reviewed my other stories.

**Kalia:** This is for you.

**harold:** Actually, I've been sitting on a couple more chapters but have a horrible time motivating myself to type.

**Wordsplat:** Hurrah! You got it right! Let's see, I said there would be a prize, didn't I? I will write a 100-500 word drabble on whatever you like. Just let me know

Disclaimer: Obviously I don't own _Naruto. _Kakashi wears a mask, doesn't he?

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"Mission success!"

Naruto dropped to the ground beside Uchiha Sasuke and Haruno Sakura. Together they made their way to the training grounds where they traditionally waited for their sensei.

"So you got him to talk to Iruka-sensei?" Sakura inquired. Sasuke just waited expectantly.

"Well… I think he did. I wasn't exactly there at the time," Naruto admitted sheepishly, "but it took a while before he started to catch up with me."

"WHAT?! You couldn't even stick around to find out what happened?! You _idiot_!" With that, Sakura proceeded to give Naruto a firm whack on the head.

"Ow," the boy whined, clutching at the growing knot on his blond head.

"Way to go, moron. You've managed to completely screw everything up." Sasuke glared at him in his customarily condescending manner.

Sakura added, "Yeah, now we won't know whether it worked or not."

"That's not true!" Naruto interjected. "We can just ask Konohamaru-kun! He was there the whole time!"

"Ask Konohamaru-kun what?"

The three teens jumped at the sound of a fourth voice behind him. They slowly turned to face their sensei, attempting to swiftly paste expressions of innocence upon their faces.

"Well?" Kakashi pressed.

"Naruto was, um, going to ask if, uh…"

"If Ebisu-sensei would cancel his bet because he had to leave Iruka-sensei's classroom, right?" Sasuke looked from side to side for support from the other two conspirators. His statement was enforced by vigorous nods.

"What bet?"

"Ebisu-san said that he'd buy me ramen if I kept an eye on Konohamaru-kun and made sure he didn't skip class today."

Kakashi nodded; Naruto's story coincided with Iruka's account. "Did you not bother to think that we just _might_ have something important to do today? I had a mission planned for us, but I had to return it because it required four people and no one seemed to be able to find you."

"We had a mission?! You could have told me that yesterday! Missions are _way_ more interesting than sitting in Iruka-sensei's class all day!"

"Well good, because I got us a different one on my way here."

"Really? That's great!" Naruto exclaimed.

"You three get to help clean out the vet's kennels, complete with pet hair, fleas, and feces."

"Aw, man! Why do we have to do something gross like that?"

"Kakashi-sensei, why do Sasuke-kun and I have to clean the kennels too? We were both here on time."

"It's a team mission," the silver-haired sensei replied. "You will complete it as a team."

"Way to go, moron."

"Shut up, Sasuke!"

Umino Iruka stacked his papers neatly into one pile and tapped it against the desk to even the edges. He then slid the ungraded worksheets into his satchel with a smile. Sometimes organization was a worthy indulgence of an Academy teacher.

After locking his door, the young man returned his empty coffee mug to the break room before heading out into the warm spring air. It was not his day to take the mission room shift, so the chunin had the rest of the afternoon to himself. For once he had few papers left to grade. With all this free time, he might as well start that new novel that had been collecting dust on his bookcase for weeks now. He could even splurge and buy himself some of the more expensive sushi from the corner store for dinner. Hey, he could pull out that half-full bottle of sake from the back of his refrigerator.

The motherly woman at the register smiled kindly as he made his purchases. He thanked her and headed out into the sunshine. As he glanced up, he made a note of the clear sky.

'We'll be able to go outside for recess tomorrow,' he mused. 'The kids will enjoy that. They've been getting antsy lately.'

He climbed the stairs to his cozy apartment. Once he had let himself inside, he set the groceries on the kitchen table and set about putting them away ad otherwise straightening the room.

The rest of Iruka's evening was fairly unexciting. He read for a bit before eating dinner alone at his table, then read some more. Afterwards, he bathed in his own house and retired to bed, only just remembering to set his alarm.

Kakashi's day was considerably more eventful. The pets residing in the kennel had mauled him as soon as he had passed through the door in effort to sniff the dog scent on his clothes and root out the treat one of his pack had hidden in his vest. Then, Naruto's vigorous cleaning antics earned him a thick coating of dog hair and several patches of poop on his uniform. The day's work finally ended with the vet, an Inuzuka by name, being called to remove a particularly adventurous pup from his tall mop of hair.

Kakashi abandoned the trek home in favor of a quick transportation jutsu, landing him just outside his front door; through some abnormality, he always preferred to enter his apartment in the traditional manner. He jiggled the lock n a practiced was, efficiently unsticking the bolt from its resting place inside the frame. All of his standard traps recognized his chakara signature, and he avoided the new auxiliary ones he'd set up earlier that week by nimbly hopping over the internal doormat.

He entered the house, not bothering to remove his shoes as usual. One of his dogs barked a salutation from its spot on the couch, as uncaring as any roommate at his arrival. None of the pack came to greet him at the door. Not that Kakashi expected them to. Companions they may be, but the dogs were _not _his pets.

A flush sounded from the hall bathroom, and the door opened to reveal Pakkun the pug, toilet paper trailing from his back paw.

"Hey, Boss!" the pug said cheerfully. "Would you mind reaching those snacks above the sink for me?"

Kakashi turned his chuckle into a cough. "Pakkun, you've got the paper stuck to your leg again."

The dog looked behind him at the white trail, then back up at his summoner. "Oops."

"Geez! What took you so long? We've been waiting since nightfall."

"I'm sorry. It's not my fault! He's got a whole bunch of booby traps around his windows. It's difficult to see _any_thing in there."

"You could have—"

"Will you two keep your voices down?" chided a third voice.

"Sorry!" answered the first. To the other she said, "You heard him—keep quiet."

"But—"

"Zip it, moron."

"Jerk."

The three lay beneath a patch of shrubs outside a certain school teacher's apartment keeping silent watch. As the hour grew later, it became apparent that their target would not be moving that night. The three hurriedly exchanged the day's notes and parted silently.

_TBC..._


End file.
